Creed Guitarist Names Demand From Viral Thanksgiving Performance

Creed guitarist Mark Tremonti reveals he had one demand from the now viral Thanksgiving Day Dallas Cowboys halftime performance and it’s a good thing he made it.

The over-the-top performance of “Higher” typically circulates around this time of year. Given the broad viewing stage, it turned into a full-on production complete with the Dallas Cowboys cheerleaders, dancers and acrobatic performers simulating flight with flowing white-draped wings.

When we spoke to guitarist Mark Tremonti earlier this year, he reflected on that now viral performance that came during the height of their popularity and was just another “whirlwind” part of their journey, but the production didn’t go off without a hitch.

READ MORE: Creed’s Mark Tremonti Reflects on 25 Years of ‘Human Clay’

“You go in and nobody before you shows up for rehearsals. Nobody tells you what’s going to happen in the production. We didn’t know. We just knew, ‘Hey, you’re going to go onstage. You’re going to perform,'” he recalled. “So we got up there and I don’t even know if we did a full rehearsal with it with the whole production. I can’t remember, but I doubt it was to the extent of what you saw on TV.”

The guitarist added, “My biggest worry about the thing was that when you do live TV like that for the Super Bowl or whatever else, the band is not live. It’s the vocals that are live. So I first said, ‘No, I don’t want to do it. I’m not playing the tracks. I don’t want to be known as somebody that plays to tracks and lip syncs or anything like that.’ So everybody’s like, ‘I understand.'”

“They get back to me like. ‘You know, there’s going to be how many hundred million people watching this thing. You have to do it.’ Everybody is telling me, ‘You’ve got to do it. You’d be stupid not to do this for the exposure.”

“So I said that I want two stacks of speakers behind me and I want my amps to be live. I’m going to turn that as loud as they can turn it. So I’m actually playing for the people in the stadium at least, so I’m not faking my way through it. They met my demands and we did it.”

It turns out Tremonti was wise to make the demand. “When we started to play the song, the playback skips in my in ears, I could hear the playback skip. I’m like, ‘I told you guys and now it looks like we’re faking it.’ I was so pissed. But TV has this seven second thing where they can fix things. So it was fine.”

In retrospect, the guitarist says. “I’m glad we did it. I think people understand now when you watch a Super Bowl show, that stuff’s not all live. You can’t set up a production that big without having some tracks going in those situations.”

He adds of that experience, “I got to be in the owner’s box, hanging out with all the most famous Cowboys folks.”

You can revisit that epic performance below.

Creed Thanksgiving Halftime Show

Mark Tremonti in 2024 + 2025

Mark Tremonti is wrapping 2024 on a high note. with the song “Just Too Much” from his self-titled Tremonti band. Issued back in August, the track is the lead single from Tremonti’s upcoming 2025 album, The End Will Show Us, which is due on Jan. 10 through Napalm Records. Singles “The Mother, The Earth and I” and “One More Time” have followed as well. Pre-orders are being taken through Tremonti’s website.

Tremonti has a few Tremonti Sings Sinatra shows in December before picking up with the Tremonti band for a European tour starting in January. See all of his scheduled dates and get ticketing info through his website.

Tremonti, “Just Too Much”